


Mustering Out

by CaffieneKitty



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: 221B Ficlet, Angst, Anxiety Attacks, Depression, Gen, PTSD John, Pre-Series, Self-Worth Issues, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-01
Updated: 2012-02-01
Packaged: 2017-12-30 17:30:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1021429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaffieneKitty/pseuds/CaffieneKitty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's not the combat that wakes him, it's his expulsion from it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mustering Out

**Author's Note:**

> This is similar to another thing I wrote, "[Test](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1037810)" which is rather darker. I find John's pain fascinating and wanted to do a different view of that scene.
> 
>  
> 
> _Originally posted on Livejournal February 1, 2012_

It's not the combat that wakes him, it's his expulsion from it. Fire in his shoulder racing through the veins. Taking him out and rendering him useless.

_Breathe. Breathe. It's not here. It's not now._

Clenching nausea rides somewhere between his lungs; his heart feels like it's being used for football practice. His teeth grind, frustrated, not helping. He was past this, things were okay. That's what he told the therapist with her beads and bangles and pen-on-paper scratchings; a blatant lie.

_Breathe. No one's dying. Breathe._

But they are dying, aren't they? Or they might be, far away. War isn't the charnel house it once was, with hundreds dying each day, but it was still war. People got shot, blown up, mutilated and killed, and here he is in a safe little bedsit, crying over nightmares. Memories. Friends he can't help.

_Not here, not now. Breathe. Calm._

What good is he here? Is he saving lives? Is he making a difference? No. He's a little grey man in a little grey flat living a little grey nothing life. There's nothing he can do but be calm, not make a fuss, not disturb anyone, just be grey in a grey world.

Exist.

Breathe.


End file.
